United
NationsPress ReleasePreparatory
Committee for the World Summit on Sustainable Development
Ministerial Level, Fourth Session, Bali, Indonesia, 27 May - 7 June 2002

Department
of Public Information
- News and Media Division

Preparatory Committee for the WorldENV/DEV/B/7

Summit on
Sustainable Development29
May 2002

Fourth Session

4th Meeting (PM)

WATER SHOULD BE AT TOP OF
JOHANNESBURG AGENDA, PREPARATORY MEETING

FOR
SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT CONFERENCE TOLD

Water
should be put “at the top of the agenda in Johannesburg”, Willem-Alexander,
Prince of Orange of the Netherlands, said this morning as the fourth and final
Preparatory Committee session for the upcoming World Summit on Sustainable
Development continued its work.

“Water is crucial
to development”, the Prince stressed.That could be seen by the fact that while the world population had
tripled in the 20th century, the use of renewable water resources
had grown six-fold, mostly for use in agriculture.No single type of intervention had had greater overall impact
upon economic development and public health than the provision of safe drinking
water and proper sanitation.

He said he knew
that there would be many, many issues competing for attention at the World
Summit and it was therefore important to focus attention clearly on priority
issues.In his contribution to the
report of the Panel of the United Nations Secretary-General in preparation for
the Summit entitled “No Water No Future”, which was distributed to those
present, he had proposed a small number of water targets and actions that could
go a long way towards solving the water crisis at the global level.

The targets and
actions were organized in the four key areas identified by the panel of the
Secretary-General -- shared values, the public-private sector nexus, global
governance, and science and technology.

Concerning shared
values, he recommended mandating the World Water Assessment Programme of the
United Nations to establish a baseline and monitor progress towards achieving
the water-related targets set out at the Millennium Summit.His recommendation in the area of the
public-private sector nexus was to build capacity in local government to assess
alternative forms of financing for infrastructure, as alternatives to
large-scale investments.

Regarding global
governance, he recommended that in the international trade negotiations on
agricultural subsidies and trade in agricultural products, the World Trade
Organization (WTO) should consider the impact on water use in countries
importing and exporting food.On
science and technology, his recommendation was to have the Consultative Group
on International Agricultural Research assess the potential for increased
drought tolerance and increased water productivity in agriculture, including
the potential use of functional genomics and other tools of modern molecular
biology.

He said the water
crisis was mainly a crisis of governance -- not of water scarcity.Overcoming the world water crisis was one of
the most formidable challenges on the road to sustainable development.The Summit should reaffirm the importance of
achieving water security and adopt targets and actions that would allow the
international community to meet the challenge jointly.